You Is What You Is And You Ain't What You Ain't

--from Dear Abby by John Prine

I wrote to an advice column, Dear Wendy.  She, the columnist, responded. 

https://dearwendy.com/my-terminally-ill-spouse-refuses-to-stop-cheating/


 My spouse of 23 years was diagnosed with terminal cancer last August. In September, after starting chemo, she told me a coworker would shave her head. I said I wanted to do it, and she offered that, because he was bald, he would be best. She brought home an electric razor a few days later. When I saw it, I told her that this was a signal event and I could easily shave her head. I wanted every moment with her. She offered odd excuses. It got my antennae up. He shaved her head.

I did something I had never done before: I went through her phone. I found she had been having a torrid affair with the head shaver. Over time I learned, using computer forensic skills, that the affair had lasted for 3+ years and had included trips to Vegas and elsewhere. Two of her girlfriends often provided cover. There were receipts for hotel visits 1-2x a month, lewd venmo messages, pictures, texts, secret credit cards, etc. It wasn’t just that she was good and had help; I had trusted her.

While she was forced to admit the affair, it took repeatedly presenting evidence for her to stop lying about much of what I described above. She did volunteer that all the sex was without protection. It also became clear that she had been trying to get me to agree to buy a house near this man prior to my discovery — and has tried repeatedly since. I feel so betrayed.

To say I was floored is an understatement — it came out of left field. I thought we were doing well. We spent time together, are raising two teenagers together, share in household tasks (I do 99% now), and, I thought, loved each other very much. She says that she has been unhappy—AND that she is newly polyamorous.

Ok, now for the twists. I haven’t left. As I mentioned, she has terminal cancer. It may be in months or years, but she is dying. I vowed to care for her in sickness and health, and I honor that vow. I want my kids to understand such commitment, but I also made clear to them that this affair is not okay and that I would otherwise leave. I have been on the couch since September, caring for her without complaint. She tells everyone I am doing a great job of it. But, she is angry that I won’t sleep in the bed.

Twist number two: She refuses to stop the affair, even now. When she isn’t debilitated by chemotherapy, she sees him. I did move out for a time, coming back each day to care for her and the kids, but she attempted suicide soon after, and I came back to protect the kids and to help her. I can’t stand the idea of taking them from her or leaving them alone with her in such precariousness.

The kids and I are in therapy, btw; that base is covered. But, I am incredibly stuck. I alternate between bereft and crestfallen. Ideas? — Bereft and Crestfallen

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Life, A Cascading Series of Disappointment

Image
Jenny has cancer.  Terminal cancer.  We learned that in late July. Jenny had  dropped 25 lbs. in the spring without trying.  She had been having vague stomach complaints since October.  As a balm for her concerns, her doctor agreed to do a CT scan for her, but told her they would find nothing.  Jenny wanted to rule out pancreatic cancer, which had recently killed her dad-in the spring of 2019.  Her mother had been sick with lymphoma since February 2020.  The day of the scan, the doctor told Jenny they would get results back in a few days. When Jenny's phone rang that same afternoon, I was in the living room with Abby, where I was torturing her by playing the Rapping Duke on Youtube. Jenny shouted from the room, "Geoff, get in here, the doctor's on the phone." "You have a four cm. mass on your pancreas,"  he said. Jenny made a sound like someone had punched her in the stomach.  "There is a spot on your liver. You have a necrotic lymph nod...
Read more

Still Muddling Through Somehow

Image
At the park, I walked my dog through the rain this morning— not really proper rain— more like air that has decided to shrug water at you out of habit. It suited my mood well enough. As I walked, my thoughts kept returning to the same small universe they often do. They are not new thoughts. They orbit the same losses. They consider the same betrayals, the same questions that never resolve. They have been captured, these thoughts, never to escape, never to be forgotten, never to burn up in the atmosphere. It is simply the gravitational field of my life now. What might seem or feel like self-pity is more like muscle memory, which tells me I need more exercise. The holidays are here, and Christmas has always been central to my life, atheist that I am. It was stitched into Jenny’s life — the love of Christmas — at least as strongly as it was stitched into mine. We carried that love forward with the kids, year after year, without ever needing to talk about why it mattered; it just did. I...
Read more

Don't Do It, Don't Do It, Oh, Lord

Image
It Hurts, It Hurts So Bad.  .  . 3:44 a.m. I walked in the door last night at just before 10 to find Jenny in a ball on the floor--between the giant ottoman and sectional--agonizing pain in her hip. I had ridden to acting with the student driver.  But, let's back up. Jenny had chemo yesterday.  Her friend Jennifer took her.  It was uneventful and she received chemo.  I, as always, prepared the house for her arrival to make sure she wanted for nothing and would be comfortable as she endures the aftermath of all that poison.  Sometime before she came home, she texted, saying the doctor suggested she try Aleve for her hip pain.  Aleve.   She asked me to pick some up for her while Abby was at acting.   During the text exchange I realized she would be alone after Abby and I left for acting.  Leiney was elsewhere and had therapy at 5 and kickboxing later, and her sister Moni had bailed on chemo because she had so much to do (Wit...
Read more